Thursday, 21 June 2012

The Muslims of Kerala have been keeping a creative identity in social, political and cultural realms. The social interference fashioned by the Kerala Muslims on the platform of Islamic humanitarianism testifies their vigilant religious life and original social existence. The God-fearing life style of the forgone scholars played a major role in creatively employing the cultural possibilities of the Islamic life. The dynamic moral fiber of the Muslim life in Kerala is imprinted by the vibrant social leadership of the awe-inspiring Ulemas. The roots of such Organic Intellectual life can be traced in scholars like Sheikh Zainuddin Maqdooms, Omer Qasi, Sayed Alavi of Mampurom, and Ali Musliyar…etc. The public opinion and communal interests of the Muslims of Kerala has been greatly influenced by the brave social interference of these Ulemas, and of course, Kanthapuram A. P. Aboobacker Musliyar is a real inheritor of this Dharma of the rich and scholastic legacy of the Kerala Muslims.

Kanthapuram would be remembered by the future generation on the very fact that he led forward the contemporary Muslim multitude from a chaotic and apprehensive stage to one with confidence and hope. He guided the Kerala Muslim Society by redefining the sense of duty of the Ulama or the learned, and actively involving in the process of social reformation, and thereby played an incomparable role in linking the Islamic society with the mainstream population. He bequeathed great respite on the anxieties of a society, which had been historically sidelined, by presenting the communal issues on the wider perspective of social justice.

We could distinguish in Kanthapuram, a traditional Islamic scholar, who had been missing from the brilliant past of the Islamic civilization.

The legion which Kanthapuram cultivated through educational and humanitarian services gives a lot of anticipation for a promising Islamic Society. Therefore, the life of Kanthapuram A. P. Aboobacker Musliyar defines and plays an important part of the Muslim community of Kerala. The significance of the revival which Kanthapuram proved lies in the fact that he could form this alternative perspective of a renaissance of the community without deviating from the social mainstream. Further, this progression convinced the modern society that the Islamic knowledge system does not refuse any developmental ideas.

For this reason alone the accomplishments and backdrop of Kanthapuram demand reading and revision. This will help the formation of religious oriented developmental ideas of social progress of the national Muslims in general and Kerala Muslims in particular. Kanthapuram can also provide some creative and innovative lessons to the emerging Islamic political thoughts of national and international scene for the very individuality of shielding the secular modern thinking with the traditional religious approach. This evaluation should be done on a unique perspective of a real scholar, who stood in the interests of social commitments, other than a mere individual.